"Oh, tell it to the nanten-bush, Miss Yuki. There is one beside your doorstone!" screamed little Maru as she came.
"Too late!" muttered Suzumè. "Already she has broken silence."
"She shivers with fear, poor jewel," said Iriya, chafing the icy hands. "Suzumè, if a coal of fire can be found, brew hot tea for her. That will be best."
"A coal always sleeps in my ashes," boasted the nurse. "I shall at once prepare the drink."
"Mother, you must not remain awake with me at such an hour," chattered the girl.
"Dawn is very near, my child. I hear,—yes, listen,—I hear the first sparrow."
"Little friendly sparrow, how I thank you!" cried Yuki, aloud; then throwing herself into her mother's arms, she began to sob.
That afternoon, when Yuki stepped into the big double kuruma where Tetsujo was already seated, she had never, in spite of sleeplessness and bad dreams, looked more beautiful. Iriya, as her daughter had predicted, found on this last day many excellent reasons for staying at home.
The robing of Yuki had occupied several hours. First, the thick black hair must be done in the latest fashion. Happily this, ever changing, was for the moment in a style peculiarly becoming to her. A great wing stood out at each side, concealing all but the lower tips of the ears. A third division, puffed high above the forehead, completed a shining framework to the pale, spiritual face. Among the coils at the back, a strip of dull pink silk was interwoven,—a flesh-colored centre to a great orchid of jet. She wore a single hairpin, a filigree toy of gold and tinsel representing fireflies in a tiny cage. Her gray kimono of thin silk showed the pink undergarment. The delicate hue appeared in puffed and wadded edges also at throat, wrists, and around the hem. Cherry-flowers were dyed at intervals into the substance of the gray. The obi, that crowning glory of a Japanese woman's dress, was of blue gray satin, with embroidered fireflies of gold.